I was born in Pittsburgh but have mostly lived in Kansas, Indiana, and Illinois. I have never heard “buttered roll” used to mean anything but a dinner roll with butter on it.
Nothing sold pre-wrapped is toasted, of course. That said, my preference for eating a buttered roll is in fact toasted - which I would order that way at the griddle of a deli’s breakfast counter or coffee shop to go, but could not at a coffee cart as they wouldn’t have a way to toast it. But grab-and-go stuff is of necessity untoasted.
As for buttered bagels - bagels are not supposed to be toasted, they’re supposed to be as fresh and hot as possible, firm on the outside and chewy on the inside. Closer to being a pretzel than bread, in a way. As such, toasting is for leftover day old bagels, or the “bready” kind of bagels that aren’t the right consistency (the usual complaint of a New Yorker getting a bagel outside of NYC).
I love toasted bagels but it’d be unnecessary to toast a really good, hot and fresh bagel. Not quite gilding the lily, but more like putting ketchup on a prime steak.
I grew up near New York, and to me a “buttered roll” is a roll with butter on it – not a particular kind of roll that might not have butter on it.
And I’m surprised that people seem confused. I think that if I ordered a “buttered roll” in Manhattan I’d either get a roll, split, with butter on it, or I’d be told that they didn’t do that, and I had to butter it myself.
Can we have some more English people here so we can argue whether it’s a bap, a barm cake, a cob, or a roll?
I vote cob.
Buttered rolls (kaiser type) are common in New Jersey, we share most new york food because of the proximity. Pull up in any convenience store in central/north jersey in the morning and I’d be put out if they didn’t have buttered rolls ready wrapped for you, and they’d certainly make them on request. Also found pre-cream cheesed.
I’m an early bird and often see the roll delivery come in to places.
My sister moved to NC and takes kaiser rolls back with her when she visits.
A proper morning buttered roll to me has to have the poppy seeds.
I knew exactly what you were talking about just from the thread title, but my family would have called that “a hard roll with butter.” Still, if someone walked into a bakery or deli at breakfast time and ordered a buttered roll and coffee, I’m very sure everyone would have known just what they were asking for.
In my experience, if you stray farther than Danbury from NYC, you can’t even find a decent hard roll anyway, never mind having someone recognize that breakfast order.
But yes, now you have me jonesing for that sublime breakfast, which I probably last experienced in Nyack in 1992 or so.
I’ve never heard of a “buttered roll”. If you asked me off-hand, I’d have guessed what we’d call a “hard roll”, which isn’t really hard, but is crusty on the outside and soft on the inside. Pretty close to a kaiser roll, really.
But the idea of having someone else butter my bread would never occur to me. I can see, however, that this would be much more efficient for a food cart or convenience store. Just pick up the roll and go, rather than have to fumble around trying to butter it.
Yeah, I suspect this is a NY thing.
Ninja post synergy!
(Can she bring me some?)
I saw this term used inconsistently in the NY area. Sometimes it was a split kaiser roll with butter in it. Sometimes it was what many called a ‘butter roll’, a soft roll with a butter glaze, sometimes just any roll. I’ve never seen the confusion anywhere else. A buttered roll should be what is sounds like IMHO, a roll with some butter on it. The same as buttered toast, except it’s a roll, and not toasted.
Sounds about right. It’s a NYC thing so far as I’ve noticed.
I knew what regular coffee was. A buttered roll -to me- would be a bread roll that’s been sliced and buttered to be served in fast food establishments (in the UK) with fish and chips (or fries as the Americans call them).
The only butter roll I can think of, that would be consumed as breakfast, is an Italian thing. Although the coffee would be black.
I spent some time baking at little boulangerie and our pastry folks made what we called “butter rolls,” that sound exactly what you describe.
I’d never heard of them before and haven’t seen them since, but you’re right: they are GREAT with a cup of dark, sweet coffee.
Toasted bagels are an abomination. However, since the bagels you can get outside of NYC are also (for the most part) an abomination, and toasting is about the only thing that makes a barely-edible bagel, edible… I forgive you.
I remember when the Breugger’s bagel chain opened, they refused to toast bagels, stating as a matter of policy that toasting bagels is a cover for stale or crappy bagels. They didn’t even have a toaster in the store! I understand their point of view but it was silly as most people outside of NYC are accustomed to toasting their shitty bagels and aren’t going to stop just because they encounter a slightly-less-shitty bagel. I think eventually they gave in.
I never thought about “Roll with butter” being an NYC phenomenon… interesting. I guess I rarely order them unless “bialy with butter” is not available.
I used to work in (and briefly owned) my dad’s coffee shop in lower Manhattan, and I wouldn’t hesititate for half a second giving a customer who asked for “A buttered roll and a cup of regular” exactly what **Biggirl **is talking about.
I can totally get behind the idea. I used to love buttered croissant and sweet latte for breakfast. I had to add my own butter and honey, though.
I don’t k now why this thread is bothering me so much. If you told me this was how they referred to these things in Scotland or Norway, I would find it mildly interesting. But in New York, where I have actually been many times and lived for several years, it keeps making my brain say “No, that doesn’t make sense.” It’s just foreign to my experience. A buttered roll? Never ran across one.
“Regular” coffee has sugar in it? That, my friends, is more of an abomination than butter on a bagel.
Just wondering - for all those who are not familiar with these rolls, when you order a breakfast sandwich what does it come on?
As a lifelong New Yorker I’m trying to imagine what the options are… sometimes after a hard night of drinking you just need the magical combination of protein, carb and grease that is a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich. Plus a large coffee (light and sweet for me) and all is right again in the world.
My father discovered this after moving to Pennsylvania. Ordered a hard roll with butter, they went in the back to get a nice day old, extra stale roll, so it would be good and hard.
In my family, Sunday morning always started with a trip to the bakery for some Kaiser rolls, so we could all have buttered rolls, bacon and sausage for breakfast.
It’s not that I haven’t heard of rolls, it’s the expression “buttered roll.” To answer your question, though, breakfast sandwiches are usually on toast, croissant, or english muffin. Sometimes a roll of some sort.